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The Period of Realism and Naturalism (1870-1910), Part 5
Question 1: Discuss the plot of Henry James’s “The Turn of the Screw,” and describe how the ending is debatable.
Answer 1: “The Turn of the Screw,” by Henry James, is a ghost story revolving around the lives of a governess, a housekeeper named Mrs. Grose, and two recently orphaned children, Miles and Flora. A governess is hired by the children’s indifferent uncle to care for them at a country home. Flora is currently being cared for by Mrs. Grose, and Miles has just been expelled from boarding school for an unknown reason. Almost immediately, the housekeeper begins to see apparitions, first a man and then a woman. She hesitates, but finally tells Mrs. Grose, who confirms from her description that it is Peter Quint, a former valet now deceased. The woman is Miss Jessel, her dead predecessor. Though the governess suspects the children see these apparitions as well, they will not admit it. The story has spurred much debate about whether the ghosts are real, or if the governess’s sanity is in question.
There are lots of good resources about Realism that you can find available.
Question 2: Based on the following poem, “The Tuft of Flowers,” by Robert Frost, describe how the flowers lead the speaker from loneliness to purposefulness. I went to turn the grass once after one Who mowed it in the dew before the sun. The dew was gone that made his blade so keen Before I came to view the leveled scene. I looked for him behind an isle of trees; I listened for his whetstone on the breeze. But he had gone his way, the grass all mown, And I must be, as he had been—alone, ‘As all must be,’ I said within my heart, ‘Whether they work together or apart.’ But as I said it, swift there passed me by On noiseless wing a bewildered butterfly, Seeking with memories grown dim o’er night Some resting flower of yesterday’s delight. And once I marked his flight go round and round, As where some flower lay withering on the ground. And then he flew as far as eye could see, And then on tremulous wing came back to me. I thought of questions that have no reply, And would have turned to toss the grass to dry; But he turned first, and led my eye to look At a tall tuft of flowers beside a brook, A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared. The mower in the dew had loved them thus, By leaving them to flourish, not for us, Nor yet to draw one thought of ours to him, But from sheer morning gladness at the brim. The butterfly and I had lit upon, Nevertheless, a message from the dawn, That made me hear the wakening birds around, And hear his long scythe whispering to the ground, And feel a spirit kindred to my own; So that henceforth I worked no more alone; But glad with him, I worked as with his aid, And weary, sought at noon with him the shade; And dreaming, as it were, held brotherly speech With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach. ‘Men work together,’ I told him from the heart, ‘Whether they work together or apart.’
Answer 2: In Robert Frost’s “The Tuft of Flowers,” the speaker is in a field where he intends to turn mowed grass. He feels lonely in his work—not just a sense of being alone, but the profound loneliness that exists in the human condition. He then sights a butterfly, which leads his eyes to a tuft of flowers that the mower left standing. Recognizing that the admiring mower spared the flowers in his duties, a sense of joy is awakened in the speaker. He feels a kinship with the mower, recognizing that their values align. This revelation banishes his loneliness, and just as before he felt the loneliness of the human condition, he now has a feeling of aligned purpose, one that makes him feel as though he and the mower are working side by side.
Question 3: Explain why the caged bird sings in the first and third stanzas, and why he beats his wings in the second stanza of Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “Sympathy.
Answer 3: I know what the caged bird feels, alas! Ah me, when the sun is bright on the upland slopes, when the wind blows soft through the springing grass and the river floats like a sheet of glass, when the first bird sings and the first bud opes, and the faint perfume from its chalice steals— I know what the caged bird feels! I know why the caged bird beats his wing till its blood is red on the cruel bars, for he must fly back to his perch and cling when he fain would be on the bow a-swing. And the blood still throbs in the old, old scars and they pulse again with a keener sting— I know why he beats his wing! I know why the caged bird sings, ah me, When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore, When he beats his bars and he would be free; It is not a carol of joy or glee, But a prayer that it sends from his heart's deep core, But a plea, that upward to heaven it flings. I know why the caged bird sings!
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